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Salazar Seeks Import Ban on Invasive Snakes

National Park ServiceThe first Burmese pythons found in Florida’s Everglades were thought to have once been pets. Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar announced plans Wednesday to curb the trade in such exotic species.

Reptile retailers, brace yourselves: the federal government wants to ban the import of some large and seemingly popular snakes.

Responding to growing concern over the spread of Burmese pythons in the Everglades, the federal Fish and Wildlife Service proposed Wednesday to ban both the import and interstate transport of the python and eight other snake species, all large constrictors.

Ken Salazar, secretary of the interior, announced the move in a news conference in the cargo area at John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York, the nation’s biggest entry point for wildlife imports.

The proposal would add four species of python, four species of anaconda and the boa constrictor to a list of “injurious species” regulated by federal law, making their import and their transportation across state lines a misdemeanor. Violators would face fines and up to six months’ imprisonment.

The Burmese python poses an enormous threat to native wildlife in the Everglades, and the first ones to enter the area are believed to have been former pets that were released into the wild, Mr. Salazar said. “The Burmese python and these other alien snakes are destroying some of our nation’s most treasured — and fragile — ecosystems,” he said.

Today an estimated 10,000 to 100,000 Burmese pythons live in the Everglades, according to George Horne, deputy executive director of the South Florida Water Management District, which oversees restoration work on the Everglades.

The proposed ban would do little to halt the spread of the Burmese python breeding population in Florida. But it would help prevent even more destructive species, like the green anaconda and the northern African rock python — both of which can grow even larger than the Burmese python – from becoming established in the state, Mr. Horne said.

The proposal will be published in the Federal Register in February along with an economic and environmental analysis of its impact, and the public will then have 60 days to comment.

If adopted, the new regulations will supplant proposed federal legislation that also sought a ban on the trade in pythons and other large snakes.

In recent months, the staff of the South Florida Water Management District has captured some northern African rock pythons, which can pose a threat to humans, near populated areas. “The north African rock python –- they’ve been known to attack children in Africa,” Mr. Horne said. “One was found right next to a subdivision in Miami.”

Andrew Wyatt, president of the Association of Reptile Keepers, said it preferred the Fish and Wildlife proposal to the proposed federal legislation because it would be subject to scientific review. He argues that many of the species listed under the proposed ban would probably not meet the scientific criteria for “injurious species.”

If enacted, Mr. Wyatt said, the proposed ban would cause devastating losses to breeders of the snakes and threaten to criminalize thousands of previously law-abiding citizens. He estimated that there are about two million boa constrictors now in captivity in the United States.

Loren Leigh, president of a reptile supply company in San Diego that sells the snake varieties covered under the ban, called the proposed ban a “knee-jerk reaction.” “A lot of these animals aren’t as harmful as they’ve been made out to be — they’re pets,” he said. “They’re being billed as these vicious monsters.”

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